General Fund Donation

By now we all know the convention of the modern arcade is dying–mostly thanks to consoles and new ways to play games like Facebook and phones. If something is dying out, we should let it, right? That’s how natural selection works, the better system lives on. In this case, the “better system” of consuming games is better for the companies and not for the consumer. Sure, we can get our games now without ever leaving the house or constant updates or expansions to download, but we are missing out on the things that weren’t being sold to us in the first place.

The Arcade Community

“Arcade Community” sounds like an oxymoron! The arcade is a place where a group of people gather to get lost in individual games by themselves. Playing “head-to-head” used to mean playing against someone with your head next to theirs! This inspired conversation, comradery, and/or rivalry! I became a member of the Dance Dance Revolution community in Phoenix and I met, befriended, and even dated people from all over the city and the southwest. Rarely did someone throw their hands up in the air and quit, mid-game, spouting a string of slurs and profanities to the face of their opponent, but this is now a common occurrence in the world of online gaming. Also, rarely in the arcade did someone walk up to the uncommon female playing a game and drop such sexy lines like, “tits or GTFO”. The shift has happened and the image of a “gamer” has gone from this

Quit camping on Robotron!

or this

My hand is stuck like this from all the “joysticks” I handle

To this

It leaves so much to the imagination! I can’t even read the cartridge titles!

These communal techno-churches of family friendly fun and entertainment are starting to shut down in favor of a new era of games. Instead of the local flair and flavor we have opted for a global market. Why? Because this new method requires

Less Risk

Less risk of getting my scrawny-white ass kicked if I trash talk and rage quit. Less risk when if hit on women disrespectfully. These are examples of risks that used to scare us into being polite or doing the right thing. It appears that the shift has really been led by the international corporations who have less risk when distributing a game digitally directly to households instead of shipping cabinets to thousands of arcades and bowling alleys. This less risk for them allows them to churn out “shovelware” and remakes/sequels (that are just expensive roster updates or expansions) instead of focusing on making new or innovative games.

Tits or Madden 2014!

Risk and consequences are what keep us in line and help us makes those decisions that are the “right thing”. We might not be able to save the arcade business model, but maybe we can salvage what’s left of the community by continuing to be cordial to our fellow gamers. Perhaps we can strike up a conversation about gaming strategy or trends with a female teammate instead of inquiring about the visual appearance of her mammary glands. We can possibly trade-up from a local community of gamers to a global society of players if we can somehow foster mutual respect even without the risks and consequences associated with inappropriate social behavior.

I can’t help but get the feeling nostalgia has clouded your perspective of what arcades and consoles are like. While I can’t comment on your views on the arcade because I’ll be free to admit I simply didn’t grow up in that era. However, it seems weird to chalk up the development of console games from the humble beginnings long ago to the X-Box 360, PS3 or Wii generation to nothing more than “well, it reduces risk of the player so he can be an arse and allows the developer to just spit out shovel-ware and sequels/remakes” feels a little harsh.

To focus on the “sequels/remakes” part of the developer problem since shovel-ware makes laughably little money and is disregarded often, no one is fooled by publishers. To reference two online webshows that have a large following Jimqusition (while I’ll admit does not take a serious approach, but does present serious claims about the industry) and Extra Credits (that looks into the philosophy of computer game development) are both very much unamused by sequels and remakes just made to print money. You also haven’t mentioned other devious things that major publishers do such as inappropriate micro-transaction (the process of paying minor amounts for minor objects) where EA decided that you should pay for Dead Space 3 and also have the option to pay even more money out for extra content (thus eliminating the purpose of micro-transaction as an alternative to paying for the full game ). Another insane thing they do is how they treat the consumer like the criminal, where to access a game you may have to jump through a stupid amount of loops and access complicated and annoying DRM (a program designed to check if you pirated the game via various means, never anything seamless though). An example of this annoying DRM problem is one of the Assassin’s Creeds games (I think it was II, but it may of been Brotherhood) where you had to be constantly online to play a single-player game that had nothing to do with online.

You are also somewhat correct when you talk about the offensive player-base on consoles too. If you fire up Call Of Duty, you do get a slurry of offensive comments spewed at you occasionally. Where you are told you are an ethnic minority or a homosexual in the most offensive manner possible. Where if you are found out to be female, akin to the 1970s where the police would hunt out the soviet spy, you’d get bombarded with sexist comments. However, it’s also important to note that every single major computer game with an online mode has some form of a report feature. If someone wants to tell you that you’re obviously a terrorist since you’re an ethnic minority, you can report them to Sony or Microsoft (or another company if it’s PC gaming, e.g. Steam/Valve) where they will likely get banned for it. If they don’t get banned by the first comment, they’ll likely get banned by another comment. There’s also a reputation metre on X-Box 360 Live, possibly one too on PS3 Online, where unbannable offenses which serves to create a hostile environment can lead to a poor rating where they are stuck in the “finding match” hunt for much longer looking for matches that don’t contain anyone who voted them down.

However, despite all this, there are communities that just simply don’t tolerate the behaviour you preach console users swallow whole. The Escapist, Penny Arcade, and The Spoony Experiment are three such websites with users who can not stand for the behaviours you accuse the community of accepting. I’d also like to mention that there are some experiences just unable to be recreated in the arcade environment. While the arcade may be able to offer a tense competitive environment filled with a somewhat linear experience, the console/PC market are able to offer more. For every game filled with the vile you talk about, there is at least a game that shows the magic of computer gaming. Rainbow Six: Vegas gave me some wonderful experiences filled with customisation before playing co-op across microphone as we hunt out terrorists on various maps. I’ve also had some of the most emotional media experiences in video games. Spec Ops: The Line was one of those games where the more generic you feel it is walking in, the more it taunts you for that belief later on. It was a game who’s opinions on the FPS genre may of been a little harsh, was incredibly justified and delivered a wonderful ending. Silent Hill 2 is also fantastically written where the “psychological” part in the genre name “psychological horror” is emphasised. Dark Souls is also a game worth mentioning because when it comes to dark fantasy they manage to nail it, along with it’s “firm but fair” difficulty. Too many games have somewhat of an artificial difficulty where the difference between one setting another another is just how many bullets to use or how many grenades get thrown at you. However, Dark Souls will make you lose a lot, but it’ll be obvious why and, usually, how to avoid it and that’s the magic. I really could run on about it, but I honestly believe other people like the guys who run Extra Credits could put it somewhat better than I can and I’ve likely gone way off topic at parts.

I understand how you feel since it’s easy to believe the loudest voice in the room is the majority, but it’s easy to forget that sometimes the loudest voice in the room is the vocal minority rather than the majority opinion.

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IDKComics

Yes! I agree with you on a lot of points! There are certainly exceptions as well as good examples–people trying to be part of the solution.

I don’t delve into all the pros and cons of arcades vs consoles (such as online dating, single player storyline, etc) or the good examples of lowered risk (such as indie games, experimental games, etc) nor do I declare a “winner” in the article. There are definitely plenty of issues on both sides when it comes to developing and implementing games for the arcade or console.

Side-note: Arcades were the original mirco-transaction! Want an advantage? Give us a quarter within the next 10 seconds and keep going for your high score!

I suppose what I was trying to do was highlight the problem of “Gamers and the societal perception of them (being pricks)”, suppose a cause (lack of risk/consequences for being a prick), and offer a solution (being cordial and treating them as you might in person).

And yes, I am quite nostalgic about my arcade-heavy past but it gives me hope that the gaming community that once thrived in person, can one day transfer to the global scale!

Here’s hoping! Cheers!

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Rio

Ah, I’m sorry for the misunderstanding. I’ll admit reading through it did come off as a strong attack on gaming culture which somewhat seemed a bit weird since you only need to breach the gritty paint-flaking cover to get to some gems lurking underneath. Then again, I’ve heard people use Call Of Duty as the representative of gaming culture, which is understandable since it’s one of the best selling series currently kicking around. However, they tend to making sweeping statements based on it. I know of someone who pretty much said that gaming lacks story writing ability, which then I threw a few titles (Silent Hill 2, Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem, Spec Ops: The Line, etc) only to get the response “well, I don’t play games”.

I think the key part of your response is “societal perception”. Societal perceptions tend to be a bit weird and panicky. All you need is a quick flick through Fox News to get some panicky news about how video games corrupt children or how state-funded contraceptives would just fuel rampant sex. I’ll admit I’m not too knowledgeable in the latter story since I tend to stay away from American politics due to how bleak it seems and since it’s barely relevant to me since I’m non-American, but I think the gist was something about some activist wanting state-funded contraceptives since they do decrease various diseases and I think cancer, so Fox News pretty much called her a slut. Now considering Fox News gets a lot of money from this, they must be popular and I don’t doubt people take things like that seriously. There’s a lot of research into a sociological element called “moral panics” which I think is relevant. Usually a moral panic doesn’t have much truth nor logic to it, just enough to make the conspiracy theorist feel clever for working it out or special for being one of the few to realise “the truth”. I think the “oh god, video gamers are dicks!” panic is partially because they see online games as less of a bar filled with all sorts of people (including the racist person in the back referring to others as “fags” for not “shotgunnin’ that damn beer”) and more like a cafe where people sip coffee or tea. The solution tends to be not to close the bar down or even avoid the bar, especially if you know the owner tends to be against that type of behaviour, but rather report it to the bar owner so he can deal with it. It’s a weird cryptic metaphor, but I think it may work.

In terms of hopes of the gaming community thriving to a global scale, it’s already pretty much happening. You have Korea (North and South) hailing Starcraft as a sport, even comparable to how baseball stars are worshipped in America. You have conventions where large groups of people who love video games can meet. Conventions such as Penny Arcade Expo (PAX) where the focus isn’t on developers selling things to critics and review websites but rather on the gamer to meet and enjoy themselves. If it doesn’t count as a gaming community currently, I’d say we’re definitely getting close to there. I think the reason for the panic among those who are 40 or above is because of the sheer speed of this. We’ve gone from playing a game with 64 bit graphics among ourselves, to playing various games across the internet with someone who may be living across the world with “realistic” (in comparison) graphics and gameplay in just 16 years. To you that seems like a while at least, to me that’s 3/4 of my life roughly, however to 40-50 year old men who are prone to be fearful of what’s currently going on which they don’t understand it’s just a few years ago. Hell, there are probably 30 year olds who reminisce about “the good old days” and get fearful about the idea of their children touching online play with “all those swearing and bad words and paedophiles and murderers”. This is even though when they were 14 or 15 they may of been smoking cigarettes and bumming off beers off whoever will go in and buy for them.

I think the TL;DR version of all that is: Moral panics, they’re pretty hilarious aren’t they?

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Nano

I don’t think you’re understanding the culture behind Arcades as well as the culture behind home video games. It’s almost as if everything you experience from video games have come from an extremely feministic, cherry picked situations.

Your memory must be way off if you didn’t encounter completely strange people at Arcades at times. Assuming that the difference between arcade goers and the home video game player is the difference between diversified players and a fat gun loving guitar man is flat out wrong.

Being from Flagstaff, and then moving into Tucson, I can’t exactly say that our experiences would vary drastically.

I became extremely involved with DDR, IIDX, and SF at the arcade scene around middle school, and continuing to go until I left for Uni. Today, in my current location, I regularly go to a mall with the only known working DDR machine in the city.

The fact is that all of these scenes had shady individuals that raged when they lost (More so at competitive games, such as SF), but even with DDR and IIDX they would get upset and quit when they didn’t get their rhythm correct.

The idea that the shift happened because of risk is silly. No one moved away from arcades because of the want to hit on women or the desire to scream like a child at a video game. Let me explain the real reasons behind the shift.

It’s incredibly ironic that your first image is representative of what killed and discouraged many people away from the scene. The more mainstream and business oriented the arcades became, the more and more people who had no fucking clue how to operate a coin machine started showing up. I’ll break this up into three demographics.

- Families.
The last thing anyone wants to deal with on a Friday night when you’re passionately playing games with friends and others is a child attempting to jump on the machine you’re playing on. I’ve had that happen at least 5+ times. What’s worse is there was no control for many of these kids. Towards the end of the scene, crying babies on a Friday/Saturday night was all too common. It’s as if adults believed all arcades were Chuck E Cheese’s, but cheaper.

- Females
Yes yes yes, I’m sure your inner feminist wants to scream about diversity, but hold on for a second. Females playing the games really wasn’t the problem here. Guys bringing girls into the arcade, expecting everyone to treat them like princesses, and expecting them to immediately have full dominance over a machine was terrible. What’s even worse is that these females were here on a date, not to play the arcade, but to goof off, take nothing seriously, and enjoying the attention they were getting for being a female failing miserably at nearly any game she played. I specifically recall one event at the end of the scene. Several males started fighting because of some disrespect to a female. A full on brawl. When asking the specifics the owner just stated it was over who was next on the machine, and when another arcade goer asserted it was his time, the assumed boyfriend pitched a fit in his face. The arcade goer pushed him back and then suddenly the assumed boyfriend and his friends started beating up the one guy.

Which leads me into the last demographic.

-Hooligans
You know exactly what I’m talking about when I state this, so I’ll be brief. Towards the end of the scene people who wanted to trash arcades, instead of playing the games appeared. Intimidation of violence, mob mentality, and a general obnoxiously loud attitude was apt with this demographic. They came in all shapes and forms. The transformation of the Arcade into a hangout spot for loitering fools happened in the last days of the scene, thanks to Families and Females removing the core demographic from going to the arcades.

These three groups are the primary reason people stopped going to the arcades, not because of imaginary desires to disrespect women and complain like children.

After reading your ideas on the current video game players, I encourage you to stop playing the most casual and mainstream video games. If you actually believe that Call of Duty is a representative of players of video games, then all hope is lost. The reality is that video game communities exist past this, aren’t filled with people who say tits or gtfo, and don’t rage like crybabies.

As a last word, I will not be a continued reader of IDK. I’ve enjoyed your comics throughout the past 2 years (Maybe?) or so and believed that you had some insight into understanding of society and social exchanges that make up it. With this blog post I’ve been made aware that at most you’re a shallow hull expressing spite and depression through the comics, instead of any true knowledge of individual interaction.

Also, a 9GAG image? May God have mercy on your soul.

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Nano

“Side-note: Arcades were the original mirco-transaction! Want an advantage? Give us a quarter within the next 10 seconds and keep going for your high score!”Please be pretending.

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IDKComics

Yes, I hear the Call of Duty arguments frequently too and, honestly, those
“bad gamers” are not that abundant. It’s like you said, the loudest voice is
often mistaken for the majority. It’s way easier to make a sweeping judgment
then get to know and understand culture intimately. Example: It’s much easier
to claim all people from the Middle East as terrorists, then say “oh well, I
don’t know politics/ religion/people.”
As for Fox News, they do the “moral panic” very frequently and are also one
of the louder voices when it comes to “societal perception”. Remember the
cyber-sex-chat-room panic? Hilarious!

So the problem persists on both sides; how gamers act and how gamers are
viewed. But what can we do about it? We can’t force people to view gamers
differently or force gamers to be cordial, so let’s take control of what we can
and try to inspire a change! Obviously, the people reading this aren’t the
problem, but maybe you can help. What can we do to encourage another shift?
Mute/report the loudest and unruly voices–like you said in the bar metaphor?
Share more stories of “good gamers” like PAX and other positive events? Maybe
if we know one of these “bad gamers” personally, we can encourage them to be
more respectful? Or perhaps we can just wait for the shift to happen as a
newer, less traditional, generation ages into power? Who knows? Either way, I’m
hopeful for the future!

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Rio

There’s no fixing it really, because bad people of every single demographic, hobby group and so on will always exist. It’s more just accepting that it does happen and trying to minimalise it via reporting rather than get into a huff and actively do something that takes more than a minute to do.